Coda
by kazooband
Summary: The war, the prophecy, everything, it was bigger than me, but maybe it wasn’t bigger than the three of us,” Harry said slowly, so quiet he could hardly hear himself.


Disclaimer: Harry Potter is not mine.

Author's Note: This one shot is a conclusion to another one of my stories, "The End," though I think it can be read as a stand alone piece. It was inspired by the fact that, when "The End" finished, I felt like Harry, Ron, and Hermione really needed a chance to just sit down and talk to each other, but at the time Ron and Hermione had just gotten married and had, you know, stuff to do. Thus, "Coda" was created, and I'm quite fond of it, so I hope you like it too.

**Coda**

It wasn't the sort of place he'd expected them to live. Somehow he'd always envisioned them living somewhere in the country, perhaps in Hogsmeade, more often near a town like Ottery St. Catchpole, and never in an apartment building on the outskirts of magical London like the on he was currently wandering through, looking for their new flat, occasionally passing a heavy casserole dish from hand to hand because he remembered hearing somewhere that it was a typical thing for friends and neighbors to cook meals for people who just moved.

It hadn't been strictly necessary, but Harry had decided not to Apparate directly there. Thinking he'd need the time to collect his thoughts, Harry instead took two buses and a taxi to get there. He'd spent the entire time worrying about the state of the preserving charm he'd placed on the dish and had nearly talked himself out of this visit at every turn, as he was on the verge of doing again.

After facing down Voldemort and his Death Eaters, Harry couldn't fathom why he was so apprehensive about visiting his two best friends. Perhaps because he'd only seen them for a few hours in the past couple months. After the death of Fred Weasley made Harry realize that he was a dangerous friend and the only way to protect those he loved was to disappear himself, he'd left to travel throughout Europe on broomstick. Harry had only been convinced to return by the narrowest margin, and had arrived just in time to see Ron and Hermione's wedding. They'd left afterwards for a three week honeymoon in Paris and only returned two days ago, which was about as long as it had taken Harry to run out of excuses for avoiding them.

It wasn't only their long separation that was troubling Harry. So much had happened and changed, not the least of which was Ron and Hermione's marriage. He supposed it had been inevitable, told himself he'd seen it coming a long way off, but he still had trouble wrapping his head around the idea that they were married. And, perhaps selfishly, he couldn't help but wonder where that left him.

Though it couldn't have been longer than a few minutes, it felt to Harry like he'd been wandering the hallways of the apartment building for hours. Desperate for any excuse, he wondered if he ought to pop back to Grimmauld Place, where he'd been staying, and check the address Ginny had given him, but then he turned a corner and found himself face to face with a door marked number seven, Ron and Hermione's flat. Knowing there was no turning back now, Harry raised a shaking hand and knocked.

Before even Harry's nervous assessment could declare them not home, the door swung open to reveal Hermione standing in front of a half unpacked living room. Almost immediately, her face cracked into a wide smile and she grabbed one of Harry's arms and pulled him inside. Harry got a glimpse of the beginnings of a small but inviting flat before Hermione threw her arms around him, nearly upsetting the dish in his hands. Bobbling it, Harry returned the sentiment happily.

When they pulled apart, Harry cautiously offered the dish to Hermione saying, "It probably tastes like stinksap, but…um…here."

Though her nose crinkled slightly at the mention of stinksap, Hermione took the dish gratefully and brought it to the kitchen, voicing her thanks all the while and admitting that she and Ron were both lamentable chefs. Meanwhile, Ron, who had been kneeling a few meters away, elbow deep in a box, stood up to shake Harry's hand and pat him on the back.

Next, Ron and Hermione took Harry on a tour of their apartment. It was a short affair since the flat had only four rooms, but along the way Harry observed something that made him wonder if things had really changed at all. Everything in the house was in a state somewhere between packed and unpacked except for two areas. Apparently, Ron and Hermione ascribed to two different theories of unpacking: Ron didn't feel at home until there was flatware in the cupboard and food in the pantry, and Hermione didn't feel at home until all of her books were arranged on the shelves. Harry found the realization reassuring. Even in its state of disarray, Harry could already tell that the flat suited them.

Though Harry hadn't planned it that way, as Hermione remarked, it was, conveniently enough, heading toward lunchtime. She moved to the kitchen to heat up the dish Harry brought and neither she nor Ron would hear a word about how Harry had meant that to be for them, or that he didn't want them to take any more time out of their day on his account.

Five minutes later the three of them were standing around the kitchen (Ron and Hermione had yet to acquire a table and chairs) enjoying Harry's dish. While it was rather substandard compared to the meals created by the House Elves at Hogwarts or Ron's Mum's cooking, it at least could be said that it didn't taste like stinksap, as Harry had feared.

"This is alright and all," Ron remarked unexpectedly as he contemplated his next bite, "but I think I prefer that stew you made the night after we found the cup Horcrux."

Harry took a few moments to recollect the incident, then admitted something he hadn't felt equal to at the time.

"I was trying to make shepherd's pie, not soup. It didn't work."

For a moment, Ron and Hermione simply looked at him with surprise and astonishment, then suddenly Ron was laughing so hard that he was in very real danger of ending up with some of Harry's latest dish coming out his nose.

"Why didn't you tell us in the first place?" Hermione asked indignantly.

"Well, you both seemed to enjoy it," Harry replied, grinning. "Besides, it was all we had. What would you have done if I told you that mess was supposed to be shepherd's pie?"

"Probably eaten it about the same way you did," Ron said.

"Very carefully and with an expression of disgust and curiosity," Hermione finished, grinning.

When they finished eating and placed the dishes in the sink, Harry was fully prepared to offer his services as they continued to unpack, but instead Hermione plopped him down on the couch and Ron made tea. Harry tried to object, but it was no use. A few minutes later, Ron emerged from the kitchen, distributed the cups of tea, and sat down on the other side of Hermione. They sat, drinking and gazing at the empty fireplace for a few moments before anyone spoke.

"How was Paris?" Harry asked, not feeling quite bold enough to ask about their honeymoon directly.

"It was beautiful," Hermione gushed, launching almost immediately into a detailed explanation of all the places they saw, often augmented by histories of the various buildings and locations. Harry listened with half an ear, supposing that he ought to have known better than to ask. He was trying to think of the most polite way to ask for the abridged version when Hermione blundered into something he hadn't anticipated.

"…and we went to the Eiffel Tower, of course. We managed to get to the top just as the sun was setting, and we stayed there for at least an hour, just watching the lights. It's like you can see the whole city from up there, but I suppose you already know that, don't you Harry? You told us you'd been there just before we left."

"Oh…um…yeah," Harry stammered, caught off guard.

"Where did you go anyway?" Hermione asked. "You never said."

Wishing she'd just gone on with her description of Paris, Harry studied his hands a moment for inspiration, then said, "I don't know specifically. I didn't have a map at first; I'd usually just pick a direction and fly."

He hoped that Hermione wouldn't press him for the details of that arrangement, which involved flying in a straight line until he was too exhausted to continue, even if he was over open water at the time, though the way she'd gone stiff next to him seemed to indicate that she might have guessed.

"I was gone a long time," Harry said quietly.

"You were," Ron agreed. "What took you so long?"

"I'm sorry," Harry sighed. "I should have come back sooner, been your best man-"

"No," Hermione interrupted sternly. "We don't want an apology, we want an explanation."

"I had some things I needed to figure out," Harry said.

"Not good enough," Hermione replied. "What was so important that you had to stay away for eight months?"

Very deliberately, Harry picked up his teacup, swirled the contents around, took a drink, cleared his throat, and said, "You."

"Me?" Hermione gasped incredulously.

"Both of you," Harry clarified, "and Ginny and the rest of the Weasleys and Neville and Luna and Dean and Seamus and everyone, because after Fred died I realized that it's me who's dangerous to be around because there will always be some dark wizard who wants me dead."

"You can't think like that," Hermione said, "but if you're right, then we'll help you fight them."

"All of them," Ron agreed.

"That's what I had to figure out," Harry admitted. "I think I always knew it, but I was so convinced that the only way I could make sure you lot were safe was to disappear that it took me awhile to realize it."

"You shouldn't have ever felt like that," Hermione said.

"I did anyway," Harry replied.

"We're you're friends, Harry," Hermione continued. "We could have helped you.

"You were helping each other," Harry sighed. "And barely holding together as it was."

"And you thought leaving would help that?" Ron demanded.

"It's not that simple," Harry said. "I…I sawed us apart to prove we were broken."

"You had nothing to prove," Hermione replied.

"How's George?" Harry asked pointedly.

"He's alright…better," Ron replied simply after he caught up with the change in subject, "but you're allowed to ask him yourself."

"Oh," Harry sighed.

There was a brief pause while Hermione stared at Harry like she thought she still ought to be angry with him, but the mention of George seemed to have drawn all malice from her.

"What about you and Ginny?" she asked instead, leaning closer while Ron, who seemed to think that he was better off not knowing, tried to get further away.

"I imagine you know about as well as I do," Harry offered.

"We've only been back two days," Hermione said. "Ginny hasn't had a chance to fill me in on all the details yet."

"We're alright," Harry said, though he paled a bit at the mention of details. "It's just not easy going back."

"You'll make it," Hermione replied.

"I…uh…" Harry faltered as the impact of Hermione's sure gaze and the words he was about to say hit him. "I hope so."

"You see?" Hermione said. "The two of you are meant for each other, you just need to admit it."

"This coming from the person who didn't realize she had feelings for her future husband until three years after she met him," Harry commented.

Harry half expected Hermione to reply with some scathing retort, but she merely shrugged and admitted, "Yeah, it was about that."

Harry nearly responded, but realized that he had no idea what to say and stopped himself. An odd, almost eerie silence swept through them and its tenacity could not be explained. Over the years they'd proved that they could speak on virtually any subject without reproach, but now, somehow, they had absolutely nothing to say. They'd had silences before, necessitated by a need to concentrate or the possibility of being overheard, but they were always punctuated by the scratching of quills on parchment or looks that communicated encyclopedias and never by uneasiness. Before long the time for breaking the silence had passed and speaking would have sounded even stranger than this terrible quiet. Harry began to worry that if someone didn't think of something to say soon they might stay like this forever, staring at the empty fireplace and sipping their cooling tea. Then Harry might stand up and take his leave and Ron and Hermione would return to their unpacking but the silence would stay with them, marking any other conversations they might ever have, always unresolved, always awkward.

"Where'd you get this?" Harry asked abruptly. He was so desperate to start the conversation again that he nearly tripped as he lunged to his feet and picked a trinket up off the mantle. It was a small glass bottle filled with layers of multicolored sand.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Hermione replied, glancing up. "It was a wedding present from one of my cousins. Michelle? She mentioned meeting you, said you owe her a story about how you got your scar."

"I suppose I do," Harry said, replacing the bottle and recalling with some fondness his encounter with three of Hermione's cousins at her and Ron's wedding.

When Harry turned back to his friends and looked at them properly he was quite surprised to see that the silence that had so agonized him seemed to have had no effect at all on them. In fact, they looked quite contented and were even holding hands. It was only then that Harry realized the depth of his misunderstanding. Never once during his panicked attempts to find a new topic had it occurred to him that Ron and Hermione might not find the silence strange at all, that the previous conversation about the beginnings of their relationship might have turned their thoughts inward.

Stifling a sigh of relief, Harry settled himself back on the couch and said, "Maybe I should put off telling her the story for a few years. She's only five, isn't she?"

"Six in December," Hermione confirmed, "but I don't think she'll take kindly to the idea of you withholding stories from her."

"Scars are rarely accompanied by cheerful stories," Harry replied, absently raising a hand to his forehead, "this one in particular. You know it as well as I do. Do you really think your cousin should hear how my parents died?"

"Maybe not," Hermione admitted, "but I think she would like to hear about how you saved the world."

"I didn't save the-" Harry trailed off. He could feel Hermione's skeptical stare even though he wasn't looking at her.

"If you're going to have to recount every time you saved the world then it sounds like you'll be telling Michelle a lot of stories," Ron added.

"I wouldn't mind some help," Harry admitted, turning to face them.

"It's your story, mate," Ron said.

"You were there too," Harry said softly.

Unexpectedly, Hermione's face fell and she cried, "Why do you always have to play the hero, Harry?"

Harry shrugged. "Never though of it as the type of thing I'd need a reason for."

"It didn't always have to be you," Hermione countered.

"It did," Harry replied, "because, somehow or another it always worked out that, when it really mattered, I was the only person on the planet who could fix whatever had gone wrong."

Harry didn't need to look at his friends to see their stunned and hurt expressions, so he added hastily, "I wish you could have been there. You fought with everything you had and I'm grateful for that, I never would have made it as far as I did if it weren't for you, and you came with me for as long as you could, but in the end, somehow, it was always me alone, between Quirell and the stone, Ginny and the Basilisk, or Voldemort and the rest of the world."

"We would have been there, if we could," Hermione said, "but there was always some reason why we had to stay behind."

"I know," Harry sighed. He lifted his teacup to take a sip, but discovered that the contents had long since gone cold and set it aside instead.

"Sometimes that reason was you," Hermione added suddenly, her voice going unexpectedly hard.

"I've only ever tried to-"

"Protect us?" Hermione finished angrily, "is that what you thought you were dong when you took off on your broom to Merlin knows where?"

"Yes," Harry replied uncertainly.

"You abandoned us," Hermione spat. "You left us with a note as though that would make up for losing you."

"We said we'd stay with you until the end," Ron added.

"It was the end," Harry replied pleadingly. "The end was long over. It had gone away and come back and gone again. Do you really want to go for another round?"

"Of course not," Hermione said, "but that didn't mean you had to leave."

"It did," Harry said hotly, "because somewhere along the way I became the guy who sets things right when they go wrong, but when things come to fighting it's not just me who's in danger anymore, because you promised to stick by me until the end, no matter how many there are."

"It's our choice," Hermione reminded him.

"Fred died!" Harry exclaimed.

"You think I don't know that!" Ron yelled, jumping to his feet. "Don't you dare try to belittle his sacrifice!"

"I wasn't," Harry replied, raising his hands placatingly even as he got to his feet. "I just wanted to keep it from happening again. Leaving was the only way I knew how, because evil seems to follow me."

"You give yourself too much credit," Hermione sighed.

"Prove me wrong," Harry challenged. "It might be tomorrow or it might be fifty years from now, but dark wizards will come back and I'll fight them, I will, but I'm already so tried of this. How many times can they expect me to charge headlong into a room knowing that certain death is inside?"

"Once more than you can walk out, I suppose," Hermione replied. Harry turned to stare at her, not expecting such a response, though, now that he'd heard it he supposed he had to agree.

"The entire time we were searching for the Horcruxes I was so focused on getting to Voldemort that I could hardly think of anything else," Harry sighed, sitting back down. "I saw myself killing him, over and over, in every way I could think of. Never once did I imagine what it would be like afterwards."

"Things didn't quite turn out like we'd expected either," Hermione admitted.

"I'm the only person, on our side at least, in the entire battle who didn't stop before going too far," Harry continued.

"You're the only one who didn't have a choice," Hermione assured him.

"I wasn't talking about Voldemort," Harry replied, looking up at Ron.

"I already said," Ron replied uncomfortably, cottoning on, "if I'd been able to I would have told you to leave me behind."

"That doesn't make it right," Harry said. "You took a curse that was meant for me, you were dying and I abandoned you so I could go fight Voldemort. I don't think I was counting on living long enough to regret it. Then it happened all over again, only I wasn't quick enough to save Fred. I couldn't let it happen a third time, so I left. I got away from all the things that make me remember everything I've ever wanted to forget. The trouble was, after awhile I realize that those things also reminded me of everything I've ever wanted to remember."

"So you came back," Ron prompted when Harry didn't continue.

"So I flew further," Harry replied, studying his hands as Ron sat down on the other side of Hermione. "I don't remember why it was so important to me that I stay away; just that I thought you would be alright as long as I wasn't there, because you wouldn't have to fight anymore, because dark wizards only come after me. Then, one night, I don't know when, I was lost and cold and tired and half way across the North Sea, and I-"

Harry cut himself off when a bite of panic at the memory constricted his throat, but next to him Ron and Hermione barely moved, both staring intently into the empty fireplace as they waited for him to continued, and suddenly Harry had no idea why he was trying to mince his words. Surely they already knew what happened next, knew it long before he'd started his story, so he forced his mouth open and continued.

"I nearly died. I barely made it to shore, but that night I slept in a bed and the next day I ate my first hot meal since I left and I realize that maybe I did mind the idea of dying."

"So you came back?" Hermione asked.

"I bought a map," Harry corrected. "Every once in a while I must humor my sense of self preservation. It pines."

"Where did you go?" Ron pressed.

"Everywhere, nowhere, all over," Harry said. "Same as before only without picking random directions or flying over oceans."

"Oh," Hermione sighed. Harry didn't need to look at his friends to tell they were surprised by this. They might have guessed why he left, suspected what he'd thought would happen when he did, but they hadn't realized that his time spent wandering felt as long to him as it had to them.

"Eventually I came across Hagrid," Harry continued. "And he forced me to stay the night, then another and another until I'd been there for months and he'd convinced me of something I think I'd known all along: that I had to go back, and it had to be in time to see you two get married."

"So you came back?"

"So I came back," Harry confirmed. "Only to realize that I never should have left in the first place."

"You thought you had to," Ron assured him.

"I should have been there for you," Harry replied.

"You were," Hermione said, quickly pressing on before Harry's astonishment wore off and he could formulate a retort. "You're always there for us. You keep us from falling apart even when you can hardly hold yourself together. You were there even after you left, because you saved the world, and as long as there's someone around who remembers that then you'll never really be gone."

"I'm not Dumbledore," Harry sighed.

"No," Hermione replied. "You're Harry."

Harry opened and closed his mouth several times before he could voice his response.

"I couldn't have done any of it without the two of you. The war, the prophecy, everything, it was bigger than me, but maybe it wasn't bigger than the three of us," he said slowly, so quiet he could hardly hear himself.

"We know," Ron replied.

"Well…thanks for…." Harry tried to continue, but choked when too many words bubbled up at once. There was too much he needed to thank them for, standing by him, helping, fighting, but he couldn't think of a way to say it.

"You're welcome," Hermione replied simply, and Harry sensed that she might have been responding to all of it.

"What were we trying to pull, anyway?" Harry burst out suddenly. "Who did we think we were, going against Death Eaters?"

"I'm not sure we thought we were anyone," Hermione said slowly.

"Someone had to stop him, might as well have been us," Ron continued. Then he looked up at Harry and said, "Someone had to stop Vol-de-mort." He said the last word very slowly and deliberately, as though separating the syllables would change the meaning, but the significance of the gesture was not lost on Harry.

"You said Voldemort," he said, surprised.

"I did," Ron replied, looking a bit surprised himself, but also relieved, as though simply saying the name was enough to erase the taboo.

"Not so bad, is it," Harry said, grinning.

"I suppose not," Ron admitted.

"I'll never understand why you insisted on calling him You-Know-Who all this time," Harry continued. "Even after he was gone."

"Old habit, I suppose," Ron replied. "You don't know what it was like, growing up and hearing stories about him. Neither of you do."

"We know well enough," Hermione said. "We were there the second time, right there in the middle of it. We didn't need to hear the stories about the first war to know what Voldemort did, how he tore everything apart."

"I never cried for Sirius," Harry burst out, as though he'd been meaning to say it all along and had simply been waiting for his cue. "Nor when I was five years old and realized that everyone had parents and I only had Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia. Not when I nearly died trying to protect the Sorcerer's Stone, not for Lupin, I barely even cried for Dumbledore, and not at all for Sirius. And there were times I thought I should have, like the fact that I couldn't was a dishonor to his memory, because I could cry for Cedric, and I barely knew him."

"We cried for Sirius," Ron replied, as Hermione reached over to take Harry's hand.

"We had four nights in the hospital wing," Hermione explained, "and we kept waking each other up on accident because someone had a nightmare or rolled over the wrong way and it hurt too much. It must have been three in the morning on the second night when we finally gave up trying to sleep and started talking. Turns out we didn't have as much to talk about as we did to cry about. No matter what subject we started out on, O.W.L.s, Quidditch, anything, we always came back to that battle in the Department of Mysteries. So we cried for Sirius, and for you, and for the world that was about to change, and for that whole stupid year when we couldn't seem to get a single thing to go right. But mostly we cried because before we went to the Department of Mysteries we hadn't know what it was like to be properly scared, to know that the only thing between us and death is our brains or our guts or something" (Harry's lips twitched reluctantly at the reference). "Until then we hadn't known what it was like to walk into a place and get carried out of it. And maybe even worse than the rest of that, we'd-"

But Hermione cut herself off abruptly and seemed unable to continue, as though simply remembering was too much for her.

"We'd have to do it again," Ron finished, though he hardly seemed better off than Hermione. "Over and over until the thing was finished."

"That's why I cried for Cedric," Harry agreed shakily, "and why the whole world cried for Dumbledore. Because those were the times when we had to realize there was no easy way out, that no one was invincible, and no matter how much we wanted to, we couldn't-"

Harry couldn't finish, no matter how much he cleared his throat or blinked and looked at the ceiling, and Ron and Hermione seemed entirely unable to continue for him, but that was alright, because they understood what he was trying to say. They, out of everyone who'd fought in that war, were the only ones who knew what it had been like for him.

Harry turned away from his friends, reaching one hand for his forehead, but Hermione snaked one arm around his shoulders and the other around Ron's and as one they sank to their knees on the ground in front of the sofa. Harry and Ron completed the circle and, putting their foreheads together, they cried as they hadn't been able to, as they hadn't allowed themselves before. They held nothing back for pride or shame.

It was like a foregone conclusion that everyone knew but no one wanted to admit, so they just kept circling closer and closer to it before finally falling in. Their lives had been hard and they had seen terrible things, and as much as they wanted to say that everything was made better because it turned out alright in the end, they knew it wasn't. They three knew better than anyone that things weren't alright, and maybe they never would be. So they cried for their broken pieces even as they tried to fit them back into place or fill the voids left by the pieces that they would never find again, and they stayed that way until their knees had gone numb from contact with the hard floor and they felt like they couldn't cry any more if they'd wanted to.

Suddenly feeling utterly empty and exhausted, they released each others shoulders and sat back on their heels, wiping at their eyes without looking at each other, but without looking away either.

They remained that way for some time, in a silence unbroken except for by the occasional sniffle or creak of a floorboard as each left the others to their thoughts.

"Do you remember the time in fifth year when Fred and George let off that portable swamp?" Ron asked finally, fixing his friends with their first proper look since they'd dropped to their places on the floor.

"What about it?" Harry asked, looking up from cleaning his glasses on his shirt.

"Nothing really," Ron admitted, wiping at his eyes. "It just occurred to me that I'd never bothered to wonder why they thought to make something like that."

For a moment, Harry simply stared at him, confused, then admitted, "That's a good question."

"I mean, why a swamp?" Ron continued, "why not a desert or a rainforest or a lake? And that's not the first time I've had reason to wonder who dropped the both of them on their heads when they were little. A portable swamp, how did they even think of something like that?"

"Came in handy, though," Harry pointed out. "I don't know if I've ever seen Filch as mad as when he had to punt people across that thing."

"Maybe they were inspired by Umbridge," Hermione chimed in. "I've never seen a person resemble an animal as much as she resembled a frog."

Harry and Ron both turned to look at her, surprised, for neither one could remember a time when she'd ever teased a teacher, even one such as Umbridge, then all three burst out laughing.

"Me neither," Ron said gleefully, then promptly lost his composure once again.

"What about a few days after they let the swamp off," Harry offered, struggling to hold himself together long enough to get the words out, "when the midges got completely out of control and started swarming all over the school."

"I think that was the only time I ever saw Professor Sprout lose her temper," Hermione continued, "when she realized we'd tracked a bunch of the midges into the greenhouse with us."

"How about that first year who was absolutely sure that there was a crocodile living in the swamp," Ron added.

"He must have convinced almost all of the first years and half of the second years before someone finally came along and told them that it's not crocodiles they ought to be worried about since only alligators live in swa-" Hermione said, entirely unable to finish as she was overcome by a fit of giggles.

There was no telling how long they carried on like this, reliving every happy moment they could think of. The emptiness was still there, where they knew they'd never get to hear Fred's version of why he and George chose to create a portable swamp instead of tundra or listen to another one of Dumbledore's speeches, but the sadness was gone. Just like that, it wasn't sad anymore, it didn't annoy them or make them angry, it just was, and that was all there was to it.

Without even realizing it, Harry found himself wishing for something he'd never desired before: that he could go back and do it all again, and not to change things, not to use what he knew to change the past before it happened. He wanted to go back and start again because, as much as he knew it would hurt to lose Sirius and Dumbledore and Lupin and Fred, it might just be worth it to experience that thing he, Ron, and Hermione had reclaimed a little of that night. To live those times in the Gryffindor Common room again, when it was just the three of them and he and Ron were concocting phony predictions for Trelawney's class, when they were visiting Hagrid, when he played Quidditch, when things between he and Ginny were simple, to live those times and be able to appreciate them for what they were, for they'd lost that innocence when they left Hogwarts, or when Harry heard the prophecy, or maybe even the night of the third task and try as they might there was no getting it back.

But, since there were not time turners to be found, since eventually Harry would have to leave and go back to Grimmauld Place and Ron and Hermione would resume unpacking and Harry and Ron would start Auror training and Hermione would go back to her job as a goblin liaison, for now they just kept laughing, appreciating the time for what it was.

They laughed at everything they could think of, and when the last joke died out Harry grew suddenly somber.

"If there's one thing I've realized in all this it's that I'm nobody without the two of you. You stuck with me through everything, even when I tried to make you stay away. Things wouldn't have worked out the same if you weren't there with me. You two are my family."

Ron and Hermione glanced at each other, their expressions too jumbled and varied to read.

"Would you like another cup of tea?" Hermione asked Harry after a moment.

"I'd love one," Harry replied.

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Author's Note: If you haven't read them already and are curious about how Harry, Ron, and Hermione got here, I'd like to invite you to read "The End," "Runner," and "The Interlude," and I recommend you read them in that order, except for "Runner," which actually accompanies Epilogues 2 and 3 of "The End."

I have one more story planned that will take place in this universe. It's called "Variations" and tells the story of the Final Battle against Voldemort thirteen times, following the experiences of thirteen different people. It's just barely made it past the planning stages right now, but I hope to finish posting it before Deathly Hallows comes out. If you're interested but are worried about being able to find it, leave me a way to contact you and I'll let you know when I begin posting.

Thanks for reading.


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